This school year, four seniors are receiving real-life job experience by participating in BSM’s first marketing and communications internship through the new EPIC program. EPIC stands for Explore, Partner, Inspire, and Connect. BSM’s Director of Marketing and Communications, Ms. Megan Peterson and the Marketing and Communications Specialist, Ms. Eden Garman are leading interns Liv Schmitz, Maddi Zachman, Olivia Pace, and Grace Driscoll. 

The program was started by BSM’s Director of Learning and Technology, Dr. Steve Pohlen. “Its goal is to provide students with real-world learning experiences to help them explore possible career paths and prepare for the future,” Peterson said.  

The interns and their advisors meet every Tuesday; the four interns have to bring a story idea that revolves around BSM to the meeting. At the meetings, they each get their assignments for the week; these include photography, stories, writing, graphic design, and social media. Along with this, they talk about marketing and communication topics, so the interns can be exposed to the profession even more. “[Outside of the meetings,] students work remotely throughout the week and are required to complete their assignments on time, as they will be in future internships and upon entering the workforce. Their work is showcased and on display in the form of news articles and banner images on our website and on our Facebook, Twitter and Instagram pages throughout the week,” Peterson said.  

Each of the students in the program has a specific role. Zachman and Schmitz both specialize in social media. They write news articles and work on captions and posts for BSM’s Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. Driscoll works on graphic design. Her jobs include making and photo-shopping the banner images on the website and the posters on Instagram. Pace is in charge of photography, so she takes most of the pictures that Driscoll uses. Although, they did point out that their jobs can overlap. “Everyone in the internship takes pictures, I’m just the one who has the camera. If there was a really big event that needed professional photos I would do them, but all of our roles are pretty fluid,” Pace said.  

All of the interns agree that they have already learned a lot from the experience. “I didn’t realize how careful you have to be and how every little detail matters in marketing. A lot [more] goes into a single Instagram post than you think,” Zachman said. 

Both Peterson and Garman agree that the interns have been extremely helpful in the two short weeks that the program has been running. The students are able to bring new ideas involving social media; for example, they brought the idea to post polls and quizzes on BSM’s social media pages. “Within the hour, we launched the ‘Just4Fun’ Instagram Highlight, which will house all of our weekly polls and quizzes. Moving forward, our interns are responsible for creating and bringing a content calendar with poll and quiz ideas to our weekly meetings,” Peterson said.  

Along with their insight on current social media trends, the interns contribute their inside knowledge on what is happening around the school, helping spread the stories of BSM.“We’re showcasing the school and what it has to offer to the prospective families and the outside world. We get to show all the cool things of Benilde,” Driscoll said. 

The marketing and communications internship will continue throughout the year. “We have a fantastic team, and we’re excited for these students to help us tell the BSM story in the year ahead!” Peterson said